WASHINGTON, DC - Energy and Commerce Committee Republican Leader Greg Walden (R-OR), Subcommittee on Health Republican Leader Michael C. Burgess, M.D. (R-TX), and Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations Republican Leader Brett Guthrie (R-KY) sent a letter to the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Dr. Robert R. Redfield requesting a briefing on how the agency plans to improve seasonal influenza vaccination rates for seniors, and on whether a preferential recommendation should be made for adults 65 years of age and older to receive a high dose or adjuvanted influenza vaccine.
“The need for action to reduce flu-related deaths and hospitalizations is urgent, especially when the A (H3N2) flu strain is predominant. More people were killed by seasonal influenza in last winter’s severe flu season than in any other since 1976, with an estimated 78,000 deaths. For the 2017-2018 influenza season, CDC estimated that adults aged 65 years and older accounted for 90 percent of total influenza-associated deaths, or an estimated 68,448 deaths. Our senior citizens, adults aged 65 and older, disproportionately bear the burden of infection, hospitalizations, and death. It has been recognized for years that seniors are at greater risk of serious complications from the flu because human immune defenses become weaker with age," Walden, Burgess, and Guthrie wrote.
